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QuickBooks Desktop (Pro, Premier and Mac), discontinued vs. QuickBooks Online Advanced

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    Overview
    ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price

    QuickBooks Desktop (Pro, Premier and Mac), discontinued

    Score7.9 out of 10
    N/AQuickBooks Desktop Pro, QuickBooks Desktop Premier, and QuickBooks Desktop for Mac are locally installed desktop accounting solutions developed by Intuit for small-to-midsize businesses (SMBs). Operating on proprietary local company file databases (.QBW on Windows and .QBM/.QBB on macOS), these products deliver core double-entry general ledger management, accounts receivable, accounts payable, inventory tracking, and financial reporting. While historically available as perpetual licenses with…N/A

    QuickBooks Online Advanced

    Score8.2 out of 10
    N/AQuickBooks Online Advanced is a SaaS-based accounting software designed to scale with growing businesses. It includes the functionalities of QuickBooks Online, as well as more robust business analytics, customization, and resource management.N/A
    Pricing
    QuickBooks Desktop (Pro, Premier and Mac), discontinuedQuickBooks Online Advanced
    Editions & Modules
    No answers on this topic
    No answers on this topic
    Offerings
    Pricing Offerings
    QuickBooks Desktop (Pro, Premier and Mac), discontinuedQuickBooks Online Advanced
    Free Trial
    NoYes
    Free/Freemium Version
    NoNo
    Premium Consulting/Integration Services
    NoNo
    Entry-level Setup FeeNo setup feeNo setup fee
    Additional Details——
    More Pricing Information
    Community Pulse
    QuickBooks Desktop (Pro, Premier and Mac), discontinuedQuickBooks Online Advanced
    Considered Both Products
    Discontinued Products
    Chose QuickBooks Desktop (Pro, Premier and Mac), discontinued
    Quickbooks Desktop Pro is much simple and easier to use, so it fits better to the ticket of our small non-profit organization needs. The other options are either, or both, more pricy and complicated. For example, the implementation for QuickBooks Desktop Pro was simple enough …
    Incentivized
    Intuit
    Chose QuickBooks Online Advanced
    Quickbooks online advanced is much simple and easier to use, so it fits better to the ticket of our small non-profit organization needs. The other options are either, or both, more pricy and complicated than the QuickBooks Online Advanced. For example, the implementation for …
    Incentivized
    Chose QuickBooks Online Advanced
    Quickbooks has made their other products frustrating to use by eliminating features. Their feature bundling is annoying, confusing, and frustrating. QuickBooks Online Advanced or Pro or whatever their next marketing/sales idea fills me with dread.
    Incentivized
    Chose QuickBooks Online Advanced
    QuickBooks Online Advanced is way more intuitive and can be used by multiple users simultaneously. The backup feature saves having a separate company provide that service to you. In addition, the assistance from QuickBooks Online Advanced is very good and reassuring when you …
    Incentivized
    Chose QuickBooks Online Advanced
    Except for limited needs, the desktop program is much better and less costly before Intuit changed to a subscription model for desktop.
    Incentivized
    Chose QuickBooks Online Advanced
    QBO has the benefit of saving to the cloud and being able to open in any browser without having to back up on a USB first. If my computer crashes I do not need to panic, I know my backup will be on the web.
    Incentivized
    Chose QuickBooks Online Advanced
    QuickBooks Online Advanced is a highly powerful tool and provides the backbone for any accounting/finance department; however QB Enterprise is a much more robust product with more features. However, QB Enterprise requires a much higher investment in software and hardware to …
    Incentivized
    Key User Insights
    Would buy again
    85%
    Would buy again
    46 Answers
    92%
    Would buy again
    169 Answers
    Delivers good value for the price
    90%
    Delivers good value for the price
    46 Answers
    90%
    Delivers good value for the price
    151 Answers
    Happy with the feature set
    94%
    Happy with the feature set
    51 Answers
    93%
    Happy with the feature set
    172 Answers
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    83%
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    34 Answers
    90%
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    138 Answers
    Implementation went as expected
    93%
    Implementation went as expected
    41 Answers
    88%
    Implementation went as expected
    147 Answers
    Features
    QuickBooks Desktop (Pro, Premier and Mac), discontinuedQuickBooks Online Advanced
    Payroll Management
    Comparison of Payroll Management features of QuickBooks Desktop (Pro, Premier and Mac), discontinued and QuickBooks Online Advanced
    Feature
    QuickBooks Desktop (Pro, Premier and Mac), discontinued
    7.8
    132 Ratings
    4% above category average
    QuickBooks Online Advanced
    -
    Ratings
    Pay calculation8.0123 Ratings00 Ratings
    Benefit plan administration7.567 Ratings00 Ratings
    Direct deposit files7.8104 Ratings00 Ratings
    Salary revision and increment management7.688 Ratings00 Ratings
    Reimbursement management8.396 Ratings00 Ratings
    Customization
    Comparison of Customization features of QuickBooks Desktop (Pro, Premier and Mac), discontinued and QuickBooks Online Advanced
    Feature
    QuickBooks Desktop (Pro, Premier and Mac), discontinued
    6.4
    76 Ratings
    17% below category average
    QuickBooks Online Advanced
    8.2
    129 Ratings
    8% above category average
    API for custom integration6.858 Ratings8.1107 Ratings
    Plug-ins5.971 Ratings8.3112 Ratings
    Security
    Comparison of Security features of QuickBooks Desktop (Pro, Premier and Mac), discontinued and QuickBooks Online Advanced
    Feature
    QuickBooks Desktop (Pro, Premier and Mac), discontinued
    8.6
    177 Ratings
    6% above category average
    QuickBooks Online Advanced
    8.6
    226 Ratings
    6% above category average
    Single sign-on capability8.6150 Ratings8.7199 Ratings
    Role-based user permissions8.6159 Ratings8.5221 Ratings
    Reporting & Analytics
    Comparison of Reporting & Analytics features of QuickBooks Desktop (Pro, Premier and Mac), discontinued and QuickBooks Online Advanced
    Feature
    QuickBooks Desktop (Pro, Premier and Mac), discontinued
    8.3
    206 Ratings
    6% above category average
    QuickBooks Online Advanced
    8.3
    242 Ratings
    6% above category average
    Dashboards8.3175 Ratings8.4228 Ratings
    Standard reports8.6205 Ratings8.6242 Ratings
    Custom reports7.9200 Ratings7.9233 Ratings
    General Ledger and Configurable Accounting
    Comparison of General Ledger and Configurable Accounting features of QuickBooks Desktop (Pro, Premier and Mac), discontinued and QuickBooks Online Advanced
    Feature
    QuickBooks Desktop (Pro, Premier and Mac), discontinued
    7.8
    218 Ratings
    2% above category average
    QuickBooks Online Advanced
    8.3
    252 Ratings
    8% above category average
    Accounts payable8.9211 Ratings8.5236 Ratings
    Accounts receivable8.9213 Ratings8.6237 Ratings
    Cash management8.8189 Ratings8.6209 Ratings
    Bank reconciliation9.3210 Ratings9.2239 Ratings
    Expense management9.1194 Ratings8.6223 Ratings
    Time tracking7.497 Ratings7.7120 Ratings
    Fixed asset management6.2130 Ratings00 Ratings
    Multi-currency support7.462 Ratings6.461 Ratings
    Multi-division support8.6106 Ratings7.2105 Ratings
    Regulations compliance8.475 Ratings8.5114 Ratings
    Electronic tax filing8.3105 Ratings8.9136 Ratings
    Self-service portal6.475 Ratings8.2134 Ratings
    Global Financial Support5.533 Ratings00 Ratings
    Primary and Secondary Ledgers7.467 Ratings8.4109 Ratings
    Intercompany Accounting8.174 Ratings8.3109 Ratings
    Localizations6.731 Ratings00 Ratings
    Journals and Reconciliations8.9118 Ratings8.5216 Ratings
    Enterprise Accounting7.656 Ratings7.897 Ratings
    Configurable Accounting7.671 Ratings8.6122 Ratings
    Centralized Rules Framework6.746 Ratings9.096 Ratings
    Standardized Processes8.383 Ratings8.6165 Ratings
    Inventory Management
    Comparison of Inventory Management features of QuickBooks Desktop (Pro, Premier and Mac), discontinued and QuickBooks Online Advanced
    Feature
    QuickBooks Desktop (Pro, Premier and Mac), discontinued
    7.1
    116 Ratings
    3% below category average
    QuickBooks Online Advanced
    6.2
    96 Ratings
    16% below category average
    Inventory tracking7.7111 Ratings6.296 Ratings
    Automatic reordering6.665 Ratings00 Ratings
    Location management7.565 Ratings00 Ratings
    Manufacturing module6.549 Ratings00 Ratings
    Order Management
    Comparison of Order Management features of QuickBooks Desktop (Pro, Premier and Mac), discontinued and QuickBooks Online Advanced
    Feature
    QuickBooks Desktop (Pro, Premier and Mac), discontinued
    7.8
    140 Ratings
    6% above category average
    QuickBooks Online Advanced
    6.8
    158 Ratings
    7% below category average
    Pricing7.8107 Ratings6.7114 Ratings
    Order entry8.3107 Ratings6.5103 Ratings
    Credit card processing8.5101 Ratings7.1137 Ratings
    Cost of goods sold8.6120 Ratings00 Ratings
    Order Orchestration6.634 Ratings00 Ratings
    End-to-end order visibility7.839 Ratings00 Ratings
    Order exception Resolution6.831 Ratings00 Ratings
    Best Alternatives
    QuickBooks Desktop (Pro, Premier and Mac), discontinuedQuickBooks Online Advanced
    Small Businesses
    QuickBooks Self-Employed (discontinued)
    Score4 out of 10
    QuickBooks Self-Employed (discontinued)
    Score4 out of 10
    Medium-sized Companies
    MYOB
    Score8.3 out of 10
    MYOB
    Score8.3 out of 10
    Enterprises
    Microsoft Dynamics GP
    Score5.4 out of 10
    Microsoft Dynamics GP
    Score5.4 out of 10
    All AlternativesView all alternativesView all alternatives
    User Ratings
    QuickBooks Desktop (Pro, Premier and Mac), discontinuedQuickBooks Online Advanced
    Likelihood to Recommend
    8.4
    (239 ratings)
    8.0
    (254 ratings)
    Likelihood to Renew
    8.4
    (38 ratings)
    9.7
    (23 ratings)
    Usability
    8.9
    (72 ratings)
    8.4
    (17 ratings)
    Availability
    10.0
    (7 ratings)
    8.1
    (4 ratings)
    Performance
    9.0
    (4 ratings)
    9.1
    (5 ratings)
    Support Rating
    4.0
    (44 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    In-Person Training
    10.0
    (1 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    Online Training
    1.0
    (1 ratings)
    9.0
    (3 ratings)
    Implementation Rating
    9.0
    (12 ratings)
    7.4
    (11 ratings)
    Configurability
    9.0
    (1 ratings)
    8.0
    (5 ratings)
    CPA Rating
    8.3
    (47 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    Ease of integration
    -
    (0 ratings)
    9.2
    (4 ratings)
    Product Scalability
    9.0
    (5 ratings)
    9.7
    (3 ratings)
    Vendor post-sale
    6.0
    (1 ratings)
    9.2
    (4 ratings)
    Vendor pre-sale
    6.0
    (1 ratings)
    9.1
    (3 ratings)
    User Testimonials
    QuickBooks Desktop (Pro, Premier and Mac), discontinuedQuickBooks Online Advanced
    Likelihood to Recommend
    Discontinued Products
    For a small business, QuickBooks Desktop Pro is great! For a larger, more complex business, another system may be more beneficial. We actually run multiple businesses on QuickBooks Desktop Pro, but all are very small. The help feature is sometimes so beneficial, and sometimes it seems like you just can't get the right answer and need to find a workaround - but this is usually for more complex issues.
    Read full review
    Intuit
    QBO has been around so long that there are tons of resources to learn and execute for different businesses. It can handle many types of businesses and is very versatile. I liked its ability to get very granular with the flips I was doing, so I could understand how much money was being spent on different phases, materials, and subcontractors.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Pros
    Discontinued Products
    • Employment - it makes creating paychecks a snap and tracks taxes.
    • Invoicing - they have a straightforward approach to creating invoices and you can even email them to your customers.
    • Customers - the program makes tracking customer information and balances easy.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Intuit
    • Budgeting is easy to input. Our entities have multiple departments, so using classes to separate and report the results of each department is important.
    • Reports are easy to customize to provide meaningful data to the board and department managers.
    • QuickBooks Online Advanced has a large market share of accounting software in use, so it is relatively easy to find new employees with prior experience with QuickBooks Online Advanced.
    • Able to open both entities at the same time, which is helpful due to the number of transactions between the two entities.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Cons
    Discontinued Products
    • QuickBooks Desktop Pro has been around for a few years and after an update[,] they force you to look at the changes/updates before you can use [them] after updating.
    • QuickBooks Desktop Pro does not have 2FA.
    • QuickBooks Desktop Pro should offer a way to store backups to a personal cloud without having to map a local network drive.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Intuit
    • I would like a manual with instructions for specific tasks, organized by index. That would greatly help novices coming to QuickBooks Online and learning its features. Since bookkeepers are old school (we rely on the same functions we were trained on), we need consistency and easy-to-read instructions.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Likelihood to Renew
    Discontinued Products
    I'd love to keep using it, and do intend to - though we've not been pleased with price increases over the past several years. In fact, we used to subscribe to the payroll service, but QuickBooks priced themselves out of reach for us, so we discontinued that. Currently, pricing would be the primary reason for NOT renewing, if we didn't.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Intuit
    It has become second nature to use Quick Books at the company. If you need a report you log in and pull the report. It helps expedite reconciliation of bank accounts, the automation of most tasks make it easy to get mundane tasks completed quickly.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Usability
    Discontinued Products
    The set up was quite easy. I took some online training causes, and figured our the rest pretty quickly. The only issue I had during the implementation process was it was very hard to change some of the GL Account name to reflect the needs of a non-profit organization, such as Net Assets. At the end I had to scratch what I did, and used the existing formats that the third-party bookkeeping firm shared. Everything else is simple and easy to manage and implement.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Intuit
    QuickBooks Online Advanced is highly usable and intuitive for most day-to-day financial tasks. Its interface is clear, and core functions such as invoicing, reconciliation, and reporting are easy to perform. While some advanced features like report customization or integrations can be less straightforward, overall the platform offers a smooth and efficient user experience.
    Incentivized
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    Reliability and Availability
    Discontinued Products
    I've been using the QuickBooks online version for a little over 6 months now (upgraded from Mac desktop) and I haven't had any access issues. There have been times when it was down for service/upgrade however there is always plenty of notification time given by the Quick Books Online Support team. These upgrade maintenance time frames are always over night hours and on the weekends so everything can be worked around very easily.
    Read full review
    Intuit
    In the 5 years I have been using it, I cannot recall there ever having been an outage or not being able to access the system. Sure, there are issues with internet speeds sometimes that are unrelated to Intuit but it is a very reliable system.
    Incentivized
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    Performance
    Discontinued Products
    It takes forever to load.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Intuit
    Since we do not integrate the software with other systems, I do not have any issues with speed related to that. Pages tend to load pretty quickly, but there are times when reports or other pages take a little longer to load than usual. It is not an overly frustrating amount of time, though, and it happens infrequently.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Support Rating
    Discontinued Products
    They are awful. Intuit doesn't spend real money on support. They appear to have typically said, first-level script readers who are sending messages to the senior people for anything even a little bit difficult. Many of them don't speak particularly good English. Considering that they recently doubled (or, if you are paying annually, tripled) their pricing, and touted as one of the benefits that it includes [..] support, it's a real ripoff. However, we have to use the product because it is ubiquitous. I look forward to the day a competitor comes up with something good enough, which has excellent support, that matches all the features QuickBooks Desktop Pro currently has [...] or at least gives us a way to have all the functionality we currently have without excessive sacrifice [...] so that we can switch. I was very satisfied with QuickBooks for many years. This latest [rise] in price, and their sheer gall at touting the benefit of the 100 to 200% increase as being [the] inclusion of support, is what turned me so far against them.
    Incentivized
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    Intuit
    No answers on this topic
    In-Person Training
    Discontinued Products
    Best thing I ever did was to attend a two day training seminar on QuickBooks, I learned an immense amount in a short time with hands on training by experts. I strongly recommend such training for anyone using any part of the software. It will pay for itself in the first month.
    Read full review
    Intuit
    No answers on this topic
    Online Training
    Discontinued Products
    No answers on this topic
    Intuit
    The online training is good enough.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Implementation Rating
    Discontinued Products
    In hindsight I would've gone back further and input another year back of historical data for 2 year comparison purposes in the account balances. It makes all the difference in our firm to compare the balances from year to year and would've helped to at least be able to see the historical data for comparison from our prior tax returns
    Incentivized
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    Intuit
    I did not participate in this part particularly much. The implementation was simple and easy to perform. There were not any major issues that arose during the process. QuickBooks has made the processes pretty streamless and I believe they had anticipated many difficulties ahead of time. This was easy enough
    Incentivized
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    Alternatives Considered
    Discontinued Products
    We tried switching from QuickBooks Desktop Pro to QuickBooks Online, but there were a lot of issues and bugs so we ultimately decided to stay with Desktop Pro. Unfortunately, we are losing a lot of Online Banking capabilities on 5/31 as we have an older version of QB, but we plan to stick with Desktop Pro. In terms of invoicing, SaaSOptics beats QuickBooks in almost all aspects as it's all automated and takes seconds to create and send invoices. However, SaaSOptics is not really a full ERP program so it wouldn't serve us as a main bookkeeping software like QB.
    Incentivized
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    Intuit
    QuickBooks is much better and the industry leader. Has all the tools needed, and was already familiar with the service level as well as support. Any other product would require a high amount of learning to get back up to speed. Wanted the simplest option that required the least amount of hassle.
    Incentivized
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    Scalability
    Discontinued Products
    They're getting better. Still room for improvement.
    Incentivized
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    Intuit
    Software is very flexible
    Incentivized
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    Return on Investment
    Discontinued Products
    • Training time is low compared to other accounting packages
    • It was difficult to adapt to DCAA requirements, [which] required [the] hiring of [a] special consultant for that
    • QuickBooks Desktop Pro is a standard for small companies and makes it easy to hire bookkeepers
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Intuit
    • We have been able to back up our payroll function using QBO Advanced, whereas before our payroll was handled precariously by only one person.
    • We have seen better reporting that has led to 5X faster distribution of reports to management.
    • We have been more easily able to pay taxes, and trust that our reporting is accurate.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
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